UK's Thatcher, rot in hell . . .

None of which is a crime - and all of which had/have significant popular support. And yet, many of that 99% voted for the measures that supposedly caused those effects. You seem to be thumbing your nose at democracy as much as at Thatcher.

As far as I know, it's very similar to the Canadian system.

You don't get to decide what their best interests are. What the people want and what they vote for and how the government treats their wants are three different matters.A better question might be: Why do you re-elect legislators that don't do what you want?

Your interests give you the right to an opinion, nothing else. You can try to convince others of what their own best interests are but it's futile to tell them that their choice is wrong or their choice should "rot in hell". You may have to run for office yourself.

None the less, that is the democratic process. It's intended to satisfy the maximum number of people. The magic number "fifty per cent plus one" is arbitrary and meaningless. I don't know about the UK but in Canada a minority government is often considered by the "winning" party to be a crushing defeat. It often makes for better government, though. It encourages radical practices such as "cooperation between parties".

Personal satisfaction is a volatile and fickle thing. Unfortunately, most ballots don't have an option for "reverse the result of the election if I change my mind later on".

Sour grapes make good whine.

I think it means, for example, when somebody points out that X won the election and the sour-grapesman replies that it was only because the system is flawed. The fact remains that X won the election - i.e. you didn't get the grapes you wanted.

That's close enough for anything but an argumentum ad dictionarium.

To paraphrase the inimitable Dr Adequate, if you had nothing to say, you could have said it much more concisely. Are you ducking the issue intentionally? The point is that Margaret Thatcher was elected democratically. Whether she was chosen by a "minority" or a "majority" is irrelevant. The fact is that she was the best choice for the greatest number of people. That fact was reaffirmed twice. If you don't like the process that was used to choose her, boo-hoo, but facts is facts.

Democracy may not be a perfect system but it's the best one we have. And it shouldn't be blamed for people's everyday opinions, just the elections.

As I have said, "majority" is an arbitrary and irrelevant number. Thatcher's election satisfied the largest number of people. She was elected indirectly. Elected is elected. In fact, it's theoretically possible - and I believe it has happened a few times - that the party with the most popular votes doesn't win the most seats. It's not so very different from the American system with its Electoral College, really.Representative democracy works that way.

That's why we have government by representative instead of government by opinion poll. Our elected representatives, as good or bad as they may be, tend to smooth out the whims of public opinion over the long term.

The public knew what her ideology was (or ought to have known) when they elected her. They affirmed their support for her ideology by re-electing her twice. You keep using the word "majority" as if it had some significance. If Thatcher had been elected by a tiny majority or a substantial majority or a huge majority, would that justify her actions any more than if she was elected by the system that is?

It doesn't matter how many people were dissatisfied. If only chocolate and strawberry are on the menu, it doesn't matter if most people want vanilla. As I have mentioned, the British system isn't that different from the American system. Americans seem to have an obsession with numbers like "majority" but that doesn't seem to generate a higher level of satisfaction in their government.